Ship of Fools: The last thing you need in a crisis is a right wing government

Thread: The last thing you need in a crisis is a right wing government Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

To visit this thread, use this URL:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=70;t=026740

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

The present UK government has shrunk the Environment Agency and cut its staff year on year. Local authority budgets have been slashed and the military too. So – now that it needs the help of these self same agencies the government is surprised that they are facing difficulties. Cool sounding committee meetings called 'COBRA' are useless talking shops designed to appease imo. No practical use whatsoever.

George W Bush did the same – shrunk the resources available then when hurricane Katrina struck was found totally unprepared.

What do you think should be done about Britain’s floods?

Do you think more staff/resources/money should be put into bodies like the Environment Agency and local authorities?

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :

The thing I cant understand is why no one gives these politicians a good slapping when they visit the flood areas .... it's not as if any court or jury in the land would convict you.

Posted by Nicodemia (# 4756) on :

I am certain that when the various politicians visited the Somerset Levels floods, there were some very loud and pertinent questions asked. Only we never heard or saw them, they being edited out by the BBC. If anyone saw or heard other TV channels, then they might have heard stronger language. I don't know.

I have a cynical nature!

As to how to help - the long term strategy should be to start at the top. Many hills have been denuded of vegetation except short grasses etc. and so do not soak up the rainwater. Planting trees would help enormously, but then the sheep would have to go - and you've got farmers depending on hill farming out there. Plus the peat bogs, covered with sphagnum mosses have been stripped for both peat and moss, and so do not soak up the rainwater. The used to act as giant sponges, but now the water just goes down to lower levels.

And don't get me started on building houses on flood plains........

Sea flooding is being tackled, rightly and bravely, by allowing the sea to come inland as it wants, and letter the low lying land on the coasts and in estuaries take up the tidal surges. Which is what happened years ago, before land was reclaimed again and again, driving the sea further out, and magnifying its power as it comes in.

If you see what I mean. I can't explain it more scientifically than that!

Posted by The Midge (# 2398) on :

Boogie, we must be efficient! Just in time ordering, utilisation as near to 100% as possible. We can't have things, or people, sitting around just in case we need them any more. That would be a waste of money. The private sector will bail us out using the laws of the free market economy. We should out-source and arrange our own private insurance.

Now don't go upsetting business by legislating or expecting it to pay for measures to prevent the effects of climate change. They might not want to pay their taxes of contribute to the next election campaign. If is far more important to attract them in with tax beaks and a deregulated labour market.

If all else fails, we can always fall back on the Big Society. Or workfare. It is far cheaper to get this kind of environmental work done by forced labour by the way.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

I don't feel competent to judge the government's response to the economic crisis, and I'm inclined to be highly suspicious of anyone who thinks they are. The left : right, spend : austerity alternatives seem to me to be more about rhetoric than actions. However, the right wing claims to be cutting and spending less, they trim fringe expenditure - perhaps for symbolic reasons - and people believe them.

So we have a national narrative about austerity, being poorer and more at risk, about having to tough out these grim, grey days, and perhaps being punished for those wonderfully easy and luxurious times that it appears we had not so long ago. We did, didn't we?

It is supported beautifully by the meteorology of this winter: cold winds and lashing rain rushing in from the ocean, the Somerset levels disappearing under water, and the good old Victorian stonework of the railway near Dawlish actually being nibbled away by the sea. A few clods are lost from the maine and we are all diminished.

So everyone panics and wails, like scared infants. The Somerset levels do flood. They were always largely under water until the monks at Glastonbury started draining them, then Dutch engineers in the 17th Century. Floods in 1919 were four times as extensive as this year's. Just 40 homes have actually been flooded according to this BBC page. The farms under water are mostly land that is used for grazing, not for growing crops. It isn't the end of the world.

But if everyone feels we've been bad in the past, paying ourselves too much, and now we're being punished for it, then it does feel like the end of the world - well, a taste of it. Lets all cry and get angry with our leaders for not fixing it.

There could be a narrative about communities pulling together to help those suffering from bad weather. There could even be some pleasure to be found in the fact that in these days of excessive human control, nature is still much bigger than we are, and our 'management' of it is an uncertain thing where we still have to take a few steps back sometimes. Part of the appeal of living on the levels, surrounded by reeds and rhynes and wildlife, and the many rivers and drains, yards apart, that you cross on the M5, is that you are there under licence from nature. The spring tides are higher than your doorstep and you may have to pack quickly once in a generation or so.

But that would be quite a grown up attitude.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
There could be a narrative about communities pulling together to help those suffering from bad weather. There could even be some pleasure to be found in the fact that in these days of excessive human control, nature is still much bigger than we are, and our 'management' of it is an uncertain thing where we still have to take a few steps back sometimes. Part of the appeal of living on the levels, surrounded by reeds and rhynes and wildlife, and the many rivers and drains, yards apart, that you cross on the M5, is that you are there under licence from nature. The spring tides are higher than your doorstep and you may have to pack quickly once in a generation or so.

But that would be quite a grown up attitude.

I couldn't agree more.

Posted by Angloid (# 159) on :

Not to mention carte blanche given to developers who build housing estates on flood plains.

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :

We could work out what the maximum sea level is likely to be over the next three hundred years, and start gradually moving things out of the way, inland and higher up. And we could start shifting our agricultural effort towards crops and life stock more suited to the changing climate. I think the HS2 budget would be better spent doing this.

One thing is clear I think, whilst dredging the rivers might have been a short term solution for some seasonal flooding it would have made fuck all difference to this.

Planned change would be so much easier on people than scrabbling about after a natural disaster. And we wouldn't have to do wasteful things like repair the victorian costal line - which will clearly have to shut in the near future. Because we'd have opened and refurbished am old Beeching line inland.i

Posted by dv (# 15714) on :

I think the OP will also find that the previous Labour government also cut practical measures at the Environment Agency (while ISTM wasting money on ineffective green propaganda instead). Labour loathed the countryside and the people who live there.

It is also worth noting that the current head of the Environment Agency is none other than Lord Smith - former Labour MP and all-round metropolitan Islington luvvie. Must've been picked for his great expertise....

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

The problem is, TINA. Since the 50s, there has been a shift to the right in UK politics, so that basically we now have 3 centre-right parties, wedded to the market economy, deregulation, low wages, and so on.

There appears to be no alternative now, so although there are periodic embarrassing episodes for governments, such as the floods debacle, I don't think it will affect the political landscape very much.

Posted by dv (# 15714) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
The problem is, TINA. Since the 50s, there has been a shift to the right in UK politics, so that basically we now have 3 centre-right parties, wedded to the market economy, deregulation, low wages, and so on.

There appears to be no alternative now, so although there are periodic embarrassing episodes for governments, such as the floods debacle, I don't think it will affect the political landscape very much.

Depends on your perspective. My take is that we've three essentially centre-left parties with a metropolitan agenda. Sadly.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
The problem is, TINA. Since the 50s, there has been a shift to the right in UK politics, so that basically we now have 3 centre-right parties, wedded to the market economy, deregulation, low wages, and so on.

There appears to be no alternative now, so although there are periodic embarrassing episodes for governments, such as the floods debacle, I don't think it will affect the political landscape very much.

Yes - I agree. We have not had a choice for years. All three parties are from the same mould, unfortunately.

I will never forget the hope I had in 1997 - only to be dashed by more-of-the-same of Thatcher's nonsense.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Nicodemia:
I am certain that when the various politicians visited the Somerset Levels floods, there were some very loud and pertinent questions asked. Only we never heard or saw them, they being edited out by the BBC. If anyone saw or heard other TV channels, then they might have heard stronger language. I don't know.

I have a cynical nature!

It seems that Lord Smith has gone out of his way to avoid the press. They caught up with him in the end, though.

Posted by Angloid (# 159) on :

quote:
Originally posted by dv:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
The problem is, TINA. Since the 50s, there has been a shift to the right in UK politics, so that basically we now have 3 centre-right parties, wedded to the market economy, deregulation, low wages, and so on.
Depends on your perspective. My take is that we've three essentially centre-left parties with a metropolitan agenda. Sadly.

You can't be serious. "Centre-left" is incompatible with being "wedded to the market economy, deregulation, low wages, and so on." Metropolitan agenda, yes: but in the sense that London is the centre of the market economy.

Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :

I resent the way pundits all seem to accept the argument 'the Environment Agency has to choose what to spend money on according to parameters'. It ignores the simple fact that the EA gets its money from the government - which means that government rather than the EA is responsible for how much it has to spend.

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:
We could work out what the maximum sea level is likely to be over the next three hundred years, and start gradually moving things out of the way, inland and higher up. And we could start shifting our agricultural effort towards crops and life stock more suited to the changing climate. I think the HS2 budget would be better spent doing this.

One thing is clear I think, whilst dredging the rivers might have been a short term solution for some seasonal flooding it would have made fuck all difference to this.

Planned change would be so much easier on people than scrabbling about after a natural disaster. And we wouldn't have to do wasteful things like repair the victorian costal line - which will clearly have to shut in the near future. Because we'd have opened and refurbished am old Beeching line inland.i

It seems I am not alone.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Oh, I dunno. The Conservatives are once again demonstrating their consummate skill at selecting the appropriate human shield in a crisis. When we had flooding under the last government, Gordon Brown came in for all the flak - as if all he had to do was rebuke the waters and they would subside to their normal levels. This time the Environment Agency has taken most of the heat, and quite a lot of people seem to be unaware of the link between the size of its budget (controlled by central government) and the number of things it can do to help...

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Oh, and dv:

quote:
Labour loathed the countryside and the people who live there.

I looked at the party manifestos before the last election and the only difference between their rural policies was the Conservatives' pledge to have a free vote on whether or not to lift the hunting ban.

ALL the mainstream parties care more about urban areas than rural ones. That's where most of the voters are nowadays.

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

I did post a blog about this today.

The thing is, yes, all of the parties are subtle distinctions of the same, broad ideas. None of which will sort out the economic problems, and so bring in more money for the government to do things with, because they are all opposed to centralisation, for different reasons.

Because there is no investment in the national infrastructure, it becomes more fragile, so when there is a problem, it becomes serious. Because you only need one railway line into Cornwall most of the time, anything else is stripped, so when that line is damaged, there is nothing else.

Cutting back on dredging, allowing building on flood plains, not having plans for "once in 200 years" problems, because they probably won't occur while I am in office - these are all the problems of short-term thinking, and a failure to invest.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
When we had flooding under the last government, Gordon Brown came in for all the flak - as if all he had to do was rebuke the waters and they would subside to their normal levels. This time the Environment Agency has taken most of the heat, and quite a lot of people seem to be unaware of the link between the size of its budget (controlled by central government) and the number of things it can do to help...

Presumably when the floods occurred during Gordon Brown's premiership (c. 2007, if I recall correctly) government spending was probably higher than it had been for decades?

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:
We could work out what the maximum sea level is likely to be over the next three hundred years, and start gradually moving things out of the way, inland and higher up.

Uhm no! There are huge problems with estimating maxima. Outlying values depend hugely on the underlying distribution. Maxima are outliers by definition i.e. rare events. This is very different from when we talk of median or average, the underlying distribution can almost be ignored. When I came into my present job twenty years ago this was a research project within the Probability and Statistics department.

An interactive Graph that basically puts under water those areas lower than the level that you specify. However, this does not work for flooding. While two of the areas shown as flooded are in the news this is not completely accurate. Yorkshire seems to have got off with very little while Wales has been hit hard. This is because of the form the weather is taking. Also there almost certainly will be erosion and sediment going on so the map will be different.

So firstly the models are highly dependent on initial assumptions, secondly it looks as if there are a complex set of factors that go to create the situation.

Basically any 300 year maxima has a confidence level around it that is so huge as to make it meaningless.

Jengie

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
The thing is, yes, all of the parties are subtle distinctions of the same, broad ideas. None of which will sort out the economic problems, and so bring in more money for the government to do things with, because they are all opposed to centralisation, for different reasons.

...

Because you only need one railway line into Cornwall most of the time, anything else is stripped, so when that line is damaged, there is nothing else.

But the lines into Cornwall were stripped back because of the Beeching Axe, implemented by a Labour government that did believe in centralisation, government spending, etc.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Anglican't:

quote:
Presumably when the floods occurred during Gordon Brown's premiership (c. 2007, if I recall correctly) government spending on schools and the NHS was probably higher than it had been for decades?

Fixed that for you [bold text = added by me].

I agree that the previous government had more money to spend, but as Schroediger's Cat has already pointed out they didn't spend much of it on infrastructure. Infrastructure projects are not glamorous and tend to be both controversial and expensive. Look at all the fuss there's been over HS2. Look at the Channel Tunnel project; it took years to agree to build it (centuries, if you count the previous attempts), it went massively over budget and finished late, but now the tunnel's there everyone agrees it is very useful and can't imagine life without it.

And those were transport projects. Flood defences are the kind of thing you don't notice the absence of until just AFTER you realise you needed them...

[ 08. February 2014, 15:07: Message edited by: Jane R ]

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
I resent the way pundits all seem to accept the argument 'the Environment Agency has to choose what to spend money on according to parameters'. It ignores the simple fact that the EA gets its money from the government - which means that government rather than the EA is responsible for how much it has to spend.

And if the Environment Agency had spent the last couple of decades saying "we really want to dredge the rivers, but we can't afford it" then you might have a point. In fact, the decision to stop dredging was a policy decision based on environmental arguments, and had nothing at all to do with available funding.

The EA chose, as a matter of policy, to accept flooding, both of the agricultural land on the Levels and of people's homes, as a consequence of preferring a "natural" approach to land management.

As the Somerset Levels are about as natural an environment as Holland, I'm not sure that this is a terribly good decision.

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

There's no magic to defending low-lying areas against flooding - the Dutch (still the best at doing this sort of thing) know how, and we could ask them.

It does take an awful lot of money. So the current metric here is:

1. How much money are we prepared to throw at the problem?

2. How likely are the residents affected to vote Tory?

1 is inextricably linked to 2. If this flooding was in, say, the coastal area around the Solway Firth (where there's also not many people and lots of farms) there'd be a lot fewer COBRA meetings and a lot more realistic expectations.

[ 08. February 2014, 15:56: Message edited by: Doc Tor ]

Posted by shamwari (# 15556) on :

Until fairly recently I lived in Somerset though about 15 miles from the Levels.

The Levels flooded regularly. But this year it is far worse because of the amount of rain that has fallen.

And the Govt (via the Environment Agency) decreed that dredging should not happen. So what would have been a problem anyway has assumed catastrophic proportions.

We haven't had a Left Wing Govt for years so who knows whether anything would have been different. I doubt it. These days I am cynical of all Govts. As Studdert Kennedy said; " When you change your Govt you put one lot of sinners out and another lot of sinners in".

The Somerset Levels require to be dredged as a minimum. The Environment Agency should make that (and not bird sanctuaries) a priority. The Bankers should be made to pay through the nose for diverting public money towards supporting unethical behaviour. And our response ought to begin with the words "Lord have mercy".

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
There's no magic to defending low-lying areas against flooding - the Dutch (still the best at doing this sort of thing) know how, and we could ask them.

Of course we could - if we had the will all could be sorted.

quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:

The Somerset Levels require to be dredged as a minimum. The Environment Agency should make that (and not bird sanctuaries) a priority. The Bankers should be made to pay through the nose for diverting public money towards supporting unethical behaviour. And our response ought to begin with the words "Lord have mercy".

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
The Somerset Levels require to be dredged as a minimum.

Why? Are they that critical for UK sustainability in the way that the Thames Barrier is?

quote:
The Environment Agency should make that (and not bird sanctuaries) a priority.

Why? Given that modern farming techniques produce what are essentially wildlife deserts, why shouldn't the EA take small amounts of land for preserving the natural wildlife that's been ousted by the farmers?

Posted by Sleepwalker (# 15343) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
There's no magic to defending low-lying areas against flooding - the Dutch (still the best at doing this sort of thing) know how, and we could ask them.

According to a BBC report last week that is precisely what the government has been doing recently.

The south west has had 350% of its January rainfall this year and so I doubt a dredging of the Levels would have made any difference whatsoever. The water will be coming through the ground, as it was shown on TV to be doing in Kent, where they aren't lashing out at anyone because they know that there is bugger all that can be done about a water table that is too high. Dredging the Levels apparently only increases the capacity of a river by around 40% and can create problems further downstream. Also, the lack of trees doesn't help as tree roots absorb rainfall and so modern day farming methods will have contributed towards the inability of the land to absorb the water. In addition, the geology of the area is clay which is notoriously bad at filtering water. Furthermore, the rivers are above the land and so any excess water is soon going to cause flooding and as others have said, the Levels flood every year, two or three times, but normally there wouldn't be 350% of rainfall falling on them within a month. Given that none of the houses or farm buildings are raised from the ground, as they are in areas within the Netherlands, they are going to end up as flooded as the farmland when the rainfall is as bad as it has been in that area over the past month.

Incidentally, for what it's worth, the man in charge of the Environment Agency is a former Labour minister.

Posted by Sleepwalker (# 15343) on :

quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
There could be a narrative about communities pulling together to help those suffering from bad weather. There could even be some pleasure to be found in the fact that in these days of excessive human control, nature is still much bigger than we are, and our 'management' of it is an uncertain thing where we still have to take a few steps back sometimes. Part of the appeal of living on the levels, surrounded by reeds and rhynes and wildlife, and the many rivers and drains, yards apart, that you cross on the M5, is that you are there under licence from nature. The spring tides are higher than your doorstep and you may have to pack quickly once in a generation or so.

Great post, but this bit especially appealed to me as there have been a couple of these stories today in fact. For example, the group of Seikhs, I think the reporter said (although I could be imagining that!) who normally go out to far flung places in the world to assist with natural disasters felt moved instead to jump in their cars and drive to the Levels with the necessary equipment and human resources to help people move out of their homes safely and quickly. Or the story of the farmers on dry land buying all the cattle from a farmer whose land is now completely flooded and who had nowhere to graze his cattle.

Surely what truly matters in times of natural disaster when no amount of planning or preparation would have made a gnat's bollocks of difference to the outcome is how those who find themselves in the midst of it all are supported by those who aren't affected, and that goes for areas in Kent and Surrey as well as the Levels, and for the people living precariously on the edges of cliffs or on the shorelines of those counties being battered by storm force 10 gales and waves higher than a three storey house.

Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :

In regard to the OP: I think The Grauniad agrees with that statement.

Of course, one can't agree with the Grauniad, since it is unfashionably left-wing, but even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

All one has to do is to see what benefit right-wing governments have encouraged for such places as Canada (Harper), US (Shrub...sorry, little Bush), Australia (Abbott and that other guy)...

What was that about Katrina? Bush was surprised? Oh, now why would that be?

And why are the environmental rules always first thing to go when there is oil available anywhere? (read, Cameron, Harper, Alward in New Brunswick...)

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sleepwalker:
The south west has had 350% of its January rainfall this year and so I doubt a dredging of the Levels would have made any difference whatsoever. The water will be coming through the ground, as it was shown on TV to be doing in Kent, where they aren't lashing out at anyone because they know that there is bugger all that can be done about a water table that is too high. Dredging the Levels apparently only increases the capacity of a river by around 40% and can create problems further downstream. Also, the lack of trees doesn't help as tree roots absorb rainfall and so modern day farming methods will have contributed towards the inability of the land to absorb the water.

Just to point out that George Monbiot agrees with this assessment here. (I realise that there are those who think anything Monbiot says must be Marxist propaganda that would make Stalin blush.)

Posted by Evangeline (# 7002) on :

quote:
All one has to do is to see what benefit right-wing governments have encouraged for such places as Canada (Harper), US (Shrub...sorry, little Bush), Australia (Abbott and that other guy)...

The benefits or otherwise of Australia's conservative governments can be debated at length (although it'd be nice if one could display a basic knowledge of them before throwing Aust. into the mix) but please do not presume to comment on Australia's ability to deal with crises.

One thing's for sure, no matter which political party is in power, Australian VOLUNTEERS (including members of govt. from both sides of politics) are always off their arses, sandbagging, evacuating, rescuing, feeding and sheltering and cleaning-up rather than wailing and moaning about the government and scoring cheap political points.

Posted by Mere Nick (# 11827) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Horseman Bree:
What was that about Katrina? Bush was surprised? Oh, now why would that be?

No, he wasn't surprised since he created the hurricane and steered it into New Orleans. Mmm hmm.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

It would be interesting to find a website or a person who actually knew about the drainage of the Somerset levels. The BBC certainly haven't come up with anyone able to give an informed opinion yet.

Flood defences isn't the right term, since we're talking about flooding from rainfall water that we want to leave the levels, not sea water that we want to keep out. I think. Dredging the levels isn't right either. It's the rivers that could be dredged.

As you drive down the M5 you cross the Yeo, the Blind Yeo, the Lox, King's Sedgmoor Drain, the Parrett, the Huntspill and many others. Perhaps 12 rivers in ten miles. Most of them are dead straight, wide, and on a normal day have no visible flow. Looking on the internet I see that there are many more rivers than this in a complicated interconnecting pattern with pumps and sluices and different elevations so that they will drain into each other in the right way. There are also many miles of deep ditches called rhynes. It's clearly a problem keeping the levels free of water.

Monbiot's point about trees in the hills to hold the water up before it comes down stream doesn't make much sense to me in this context. For one thing it has been too wet. I can see that letting the highlands get soggy could absorb a week or two's rain, but we're now in the eighth week of storms and the rain is just bound to pour down to the levels. And the Mendips are limestone. Water doesn't stay on the surface for long there, it goes vertically down into underground streams and emerges at the edges of the hills very fast.

I also don't see any trade off between floods and bird sanctuaries. Compared to putting in a new river or two, bird sanctuaries are cheap cheap, and probably perfectly compatible with whatever else we might want to do.

I just think it's been too wet. People haven't been washed away. As far as I know saltwater isn't contaminating the land. Bridges haven't collapsed. Cattle haven't drowned.

What it does do, though, is tap into the 'naughty humans' myth. That is what is driving the news story.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

The point about bird reserves needs some amplification. I think we are talking about wetlands, which can be used to take up a lot of water like a massive sponge; they also have other functions such as removing pollution, preventing soil erosion, and so on.

I suppose the point is that there used to be natural wetlands, which absorbed a lot of water, but they have been drained, farmed, and the water has to go somewhere.

This also connects with the restoration of peat bogs and moorland, which can also be used to hold water.

These are not automatic solutions - there has to be careful overall assessment of a large area, within a strategic plan to avoid flooding - no doubt, the government is on top of this (*sarcasm alert*).

Incidentally, it's interesting how little discussion there is of climate change - I know that you can't link one event to this, but you do start to wonder!

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:

Incidentally, it's interesting how little discussion there is of climate change - I know that you can't link one event to this, but you do start to wonder!

The Met Office is beginning to wonder too.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

I think Cameron made some reference to climate change, but it's not popular amongst Tory politicians, and in fact, politicians in general, who probably hope that it will all go away quietly, so they can get on with planning how to win the next election. What could be more important than that?

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Doc Tor:

quote:
1 is inextricably linked to 2. If this flooding was in, say, the coastal area around the Solway Firth (where there's also not many people and lots of farms) there'd be a lot fewer COBRA meetings and a lot more realistic expectations.

Good points, but there's another factor that you forgot to mention:

3. How many people from London have holiday or weekend cottages in the area?

[ 09. February 2014, 09:02: Message edited by: Jane R ]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Let it be said though, that planning flood defences does go on all the time - for example, I think Worcester, which normally floods, has not been so badly affected so far, after new flood measures were built.

But part of this planning is also to deliberately allow flooding in some areas; possibly, this decision has been taken in relation to the Levels, since it's too big and too sparsely populated, although no doubt, they won't be shouting that from the roof tops right now.

Posted by balaam (# 4543) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I think Cameron made some reference to climate change, but it's not popular amongst Tory politicians, and in fact, politicians in general, who probably hope that it will all go away quietly, so they can get on with planning how to win the next election. What could be more important than that?

The problem is BBC lack of bias. In the early part of the climate change debate the BBC would let scientists who said there was no global warming equal time in debate with those who said the planet was warming.

The problem is that the latter far outnumbered the former, and the impression was not that the global warming deniers were a small minority, but that it was an unknown. The BBC idea of being unbiased is biased towards minority views.

But I don't think that it is the right-wingness of the UK government that is the problem. The US government has never been socialist by UK standards, but the New Deal of the 1930s (particularly the less liberal First New Deal) this would be centre right by UK standards.

It is the insistence that financial problems should be tackled by cuts alone that is the problem. If the problem takes longer than anticipated to solve what will they do when there's nothing left to cut? We need to have some growth measures as well as cuts. This can be done without resorting to left wing politics.

Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:
Originally posted by Horseman Bree:
What was that about Katrina? Bush was surprised? Oh, now why would that be?

No, he wasn't surprised since he created the hurricane and steered it into New Orleans. Mmm hmm.

from the linked article:

quote:
‘George Bush, a self-professed shrinker of federal government, displayed a similar inability to act in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.'

So he was surprised when it turned out that governments that can act are, in fact, needed.

Mmm hmm

I can play childish if necessary, but what is your actual point?

Posted by Taliesin (# 14017) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:

Incidentally, it's interesting how little discussion there is of climate change - I know that you can't link one event to this, but you do start to wonder!
The Met Office is beginning to wonder too.

I notice he says :

quote:
David Cameron has said the UK must be prepared for more extreme weather.

be 'be prepared' I think he means 'put up with' and 'stop moaning about' and especially 'don't imagine it's anyone else's responsibility'

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:

Incidentally, it's interesting how little discussion there is of climate change - I know that you can't link one event to this, but you do start to wonder!
The Met Office is beginning to wonder too.
I notice he says :

quote:
David Cameron has said the UK must be prepared for more extreme weather.
be 'be prepared' I think he means 'put up with' and 'stop moaning about' and especially 'don't imagine it's anyone else's responsibility'

Isn't Cameron also giving a perfunctory nod to the green agenda, whilst also saying sotto voce to his backbenchers, 'don't worry, we aren't going to make a song and dance about climate change, as we know it only upsets the Tory voters in the Home Counties - vote blue, and we'll fuck the greens up the arse, if you will forgive the indelicacy'?

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

posted by quetalcoatl

quote:
Isn't Cameron also giving a perfunctory nod to the green agenda, whilst also saying sotto voce to his backbenchers, 'don't worry, we aren't going to make a song and dance about climate change, as we know it only upsets the Tory voters in the Home Counties - vote blue, and we'll fuck the greens up the arse, if you will forgive the indelicacy'?

No.

But what Mr Cameron, among some politicians from all parties, is saying is that choices have to be made between some supposedly 'green' ideas and others. The case of future electrical generating needs is a classic example: it is all well and good saying using only wind/wave, but if you persist in trying to use a method (wind) that cannot be accurately forecasted, and at the same time also insist on allowing potentially infinite growth in population, and hence infinite increased demand, then something has to give. At that stage blanket bans on both fracking and nuclear - and possibly also of tidal generation if it comes to a clear choice between wetland habitat/birds and generation of power - is obstructive, clueless and stupid.

Posted by Mere Nick (# 11827) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Horseman Bree:
I can play childish if necessary, but what is your actual point?

You can go ahead and play it if you want, whatever floats your boat. I just find it interesting when people complain about Bush regarding Katrina but fail to mention the sorry job done by governor Blanco and mayor Nagin, too.

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

I see the loathsome Pickles is now blaming the Environment Agency for their advice re dredging in the Levels. 'We shouldn't have listened to them!'

As you, I and everyone who's ever worked in the Civil Service knows, offer advice that involves spending money on a potential risk (ie one that may not happen before the next election) and you will be told to advise again. The man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
But what Mr Cameron, among some politicians from all parties, is saying is that choices have to be made between some supposedly 'green' ideas and others. The case of future electrical generating needs is a classic example: it is all well and good saying using only wind/wave, but if you persist in trying to use a method (wind) that cannot be accurately forecasted, and at the same time also insist on allowing potentially infinite growth in population, and hence infinite increased demand, then something has to give. At that stage blanket bans on both fracking and nuclear - and possibly also of tidal generation if it comes to a clear choice between wetland habitat/birds and generation of power - is obstructive, clueless and stupid.

Sorry, but this is pretty clueless in itself.

Generating electricity isn't magic: it involves either turning a turbine by diverse and sundry inputs of mechanical energy, either directly or by turning water into steam, or that new fangled photovoltaic method. More energy is expended in the skies, around the coasts and even under the ground of the UK than we'll use in the currently foreseeable future without burning so much as a twig.

This is not to say that 100% renewables is easy, or necessarily cheap in the short-medium term. A reliable storage mechanism needs to be found to smooth out the peaks and troughs of generation. But it is, in particular a problem of right-wing governments that short-termism and faux-conservation come together to stymie the century-long planning that's actually needed.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

quote:

1. How much money are we prepared to throw at the problem?

2. How likely are the residents affected to vote Tory?

1 is inextricably linked to 2. If this flooding was in, say, the coastal area around the Solway Firth (where there's also not many people and lots of farms) there'd be a lot fewer COBRA meetings and a lot more realistic expectations. [/QB]

I sort of agree with the point you're making, but, on a point of order:

2 of the three seats touching on the Solway Firth, Penrith and the Border, and Dumfriesshire Clydesdale and Tweeddale, are Conservative (the other's Workington which is Labour), and one of them is their only Scottish seat (and historically marginal). The North Coast of the Workington constituency since the boundary changes include areas around Silloth which used to be part of Penrith & the Border until 2010 and are historically blue, which means that pretty well both sides of the Solway Firth are indeed Tory voters either in current seats, or the sort of people who need to be built on to win seats back. Accepting of course, the snowball's chance in hell of turning Workington blue.

Sorry, psephology fascinats me!

I think we can be pretty sure COBRA would be meeting as frequently for the Solway Firth as for southern England - regardless of derogation to the Scottish Executive on one side of the firth.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

sorry, stuffed up the coding there...

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I sort of agree with the point you're making, but, on a point of order:

Even as I was typing it, I was thinking "hang on..."

I was originally thinking of the Wash, but knew that was true blue. It turns out there aren't many low-lying agricultural constituencies that return non-Conservative MPs. Mea culpa.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

betjemaniac:

quote:
I think we can be pretty sure COBRA would be meeting as frequently for the Solway Firth as for southern England - regardless of derogation to the Scottish Executive on one side of the firth.

Yes, OK. You are probably right - the government certainly worked hard after the floods in 2009.

Actually most of that was under the previous government, now I come to think of it. But if you compare what happened after the Cumbrian floods in 2009 and what's happening now, the political response is very similar - up to and including Prince Charles providing tea and sympathy...

Most agricultural communities vote Tory, having bought the line that they are the only party that really cares about rural England.

[ 10. February 2014, 08:34: Message edited by: Jane R ]

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
The present UK government has shrunk the Environment Agency and cut its staff year on year.

The Guido Fawkes Blog has some interesting information about the Environment Agency:

- 10% of the Agency's staff have been cut, leaving 11,200 personnel;

- the Environment Agency for England has more staff than the equivalent bodies in Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Sweden and Austria combined;

- the United States' Environmental Protection Agency has only slightly more staff (15,913); and

- the Environment Agency spends more on PR than it does on dredging rivers.

The comments by the whistle blower in the article suggests that under-manning isn't the problem, but staff management.

quote:
Do you think more staff/resources/money should be put into bodies like the Environment Agency...?

Based on the above, it appears that resources aren't necessarily the problem.

Posted by The Midge (# 2398) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
The present UK government has shrunk the Environment Agency and cut its staff year on year.
The Guido Fawkes Blog has some interesting information about the Environment Agency:

- 10% of the Agency's staff have been cut, leaving 11,200 personnel;

- the Environment Agency for England has more staff than the equivalent bodies in Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Sweden and Austria combined;

- the United States' Environmental Protection Agency has only slightly more staff (15,913); and

- the Environment Agency spends more on PR than it does on dredging rivers.

The comments by the whistle blower in the article suggests that under-manning isn't the problem, but staff management.

quote:
Do you think more staff/resources/money should be put into bodies like the Environment Agency...?
Based on the above, it appears that resources aren't necessarily the problem.

But what are these other agencies meant to do?

The EA is responsible for pollution control, protection of wildlife, invasive weeds, pest and diseases (like the ash dieback crisis), administration of conservation grants, waste management, control and regulation of pesticides, planning, climate change and other environmental policies. Oh, we have rather a lot of waterways and coastline to look after compared with most countries.

How much of the problem is with the system and policies that the agency is supposed to implement?

As far as flood prevention and drainage management is concerned there is no one agency responsible for it. Local government (County, districts, Parish and Unitary authorities) are responsible for local water courses and drains, the water companies for sewers, land owners for certain riparian duties, the highways agency and various for all that hard tarmac that is the trunk road system. The EA is only responsible for main rivers and designated water ways. None of them are particularly good at ditch cleaning and maintenance of dew ponds. This sort of maintenance has been reduced and reduced since the advent of compulsory competitive tendering and the cuts of the 1980's. Administrations of all colours have contributed to the situation. There is a distinct lack of a joined up approach. Central government should be responsible for that surely?

Above all else, there has been a hell of a lot of rain recently. Maybe the government should show the piety and wisdom of King Canute and admit that there is a limit to what can be done.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:

How much of the problem is with the system and policies that the agency is supposed to implement?

Surely the whole point of setting up the Environment Agency was to make that a question for the Environment Agency and mean the government doesn't get to dictate the systems and policies that the agency is supposed to implement?

The only thing the government gets to do is set the budgets, not the priorities or processes within that.

A more pertinant question might be the terms of reference of the EA, and the bodies, responsibilities, and budgets which were subsumed into it at foundation. Certainly the loss of autonomy of local drainage boards was a huge error - and I say that as a rural type that has had an opinion on this for a lot longer than the past weeks it's been in the news! (Suddenly, and this isn't aimed at the good people of this board, everyone's an expert on dredging - I love it!)

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

Oh do stop confusing the issue with facts, you've ruined a perfectly good piece of scaremongering.

The problem here isn't that it's a right wing government but that it's a British coalition government and the partners have had enough. The country is caught up in this acrimonious breakdown of what was, at best a marriage of convenience.

Both parties are now trying to distance themselves from one another while maintaining something akin to a government.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:
Oh, we have rather a lot of waterways and coastline to look after compared with most countries.

Indeed, although if the waterway is navigable then that's the Canal and River Trust (the agency formerly known as British Waterways)'s problem not the EA's.

The coastline can be an even more unholy trinity of those two agencies, and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, if you get the location right!

Posted by The Midge (# 2398) on :

quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:

How much of the problem is with the system and policies that the agency is supposed to implement?

Surely the whole point of setting up the Environment Agency was to make that a question for the Environment Agency and mean the government doesn't get to dictate the systems and policies that the agency is supposed to implement?

The only thing the government gets to do is set the budgets, not the priorities or processes within that.

A more pertinant question might be the terms of reference of the EA, and the bodies, responsibilities, and budgets which were subsumed into it at foundation. Certainly the loss of autonomy of local drainage boards was a huge error - and I say that as a rural type that has had an opinion on this for a lot longer than the past weeks it's been in the news! (Suddenly, and this isn't aimed at the good people of this board, everyone's an expert on dredging - I love it!)

Well yes and no.

There is a whole gamut of government interference and priority setting as everyone who has worked in the public sector will know. This is every thing from procurement and financial policies and procedure to the local MP, councillor, or other elected person writing to ask why have/ haven't you done x (sometimes they argue both ways over the same issue depending what the latest complaint is in their inbox [Roll Eyes]

They tend to have a short memory IME) and demanding that their request be met. In the end the QUANGOS, civil service and local authorities implement government policies and their objectives.

Then we get the undignified spectacle of the government minister standing up and slating the agency for not doing work for which it isn't funded.

In Britain we set a budget and work to that rather than ask ourselves what we are/ are not going to do and work out how much it costs to do the job properly; or alternatively manage expectations of the public and admit that when something extreme happens then the infrastructure and agencies that manage them won't be able to cope. Capital projects tend to be funded but revenue for maintenance of those assets is squeezed. Therefore the life of those assets is reduced.

My expertise happens to be in the management of the environment. However there seems to a similar funding crisis in social care (Radio 4 had a program about how care agencies are paid at rates below NME + basic overheads for care workers), health care, road maintenance and the armed forces. Not to mention a shortfall in the funding of pension provision.

I fear it is the nature of politicians to manage by crisis and if it isn't flood it will be drought, disease, riot, another child murdered by their carers and so on. Such is the human condition.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:

My expertise happens to be in the management of the environment. However there seems to a similar funding crisis in social care (Radio 4 had a program about how care agencies are paid at rates below NME + basic overheads for care workers), health care, road maintenance and the armed forces. Not to mention a shortfall in the funding of pension provision.

I fear it is the nature of politicians to manage by crisis and if it isn't flood it will be drought, disease, riot, another child murdered by their carers and so on. Such is the human condition.

As a former service person, agricultural type, and child of state sector teachers, I completely agree with all of that.

Posted by seekingsister (# 17707) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

- the United States' Environmental Protection Agency has only slightly more staff (15,913); and

This is very misleading.

There are many other agencies outside of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that are responsible for responding to national disasters and to dredging. They include:

- Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
- Army Corps of Engineers
- US Coast Guard
- state police

FEMA alone has 7,500 employees. The Army Corps of Engineers has more than 36,000 military and civilian staff and most of their work is around flood control, waterways, and environmental management.

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

- the United States' Environmental Protection Agency has only slightly more staff (15,913); and

This is very misleading.

There are many other agencies outside of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that are responsible for responding to national disasters and to dredging. They include:

- Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
- Army Corps of Engineers
- US Coast Guard
- state police

FEMA alone has 7,500 employees. The Army Corps of Engineers has more than 36,000 military and civilian staff and most of their work is around flood control, waterways, and environmental management.

I imagine you could also add National Parks employees to that, too.

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

If you want to go into detail as to why the flooding of the Levels is so much worse you need to look way beyond the land currently underwater.

Part of the problem is that much of the agricultural land that feeds the rivers that go through the levels is now of the 'prairie' type of field: it is not the small patchwork of meadow but, in the main, vast tracts of bare earth.

The later harvesting of crops used for animal feed has a lot to do with this: the autumn rains arrive before they have a carpet of green to hold the soil and so the rain just runs off - and takes a load of soil with it.

If you think this is far-fetched you only need to look at the reddish colour of so much of the flood water - that is soil in there.

The size of the fields also doesn't help - hedgerows (with their often-accompanying ditches) played a vital part in slowing down erosion, achoring soil and dealing with run-off. And the smaller field sizes meant there were far more miles of drainage ditches than you get with 'prairie fields'.

If you want to know where to push some blame look at the Min of Ag in the late 1990s-early 2000s: they took the decision that the subsidies to be paid (out of EU money, not from UK source directly) was to be at a lower rate: the higher rate would have ensured that conditions could have been imposed to insist on keeping things like the traditional hedge-and-ditch systems in place - but it was decided to go for the lower rate which meant conditions couldn't be imposed.

The blame for much of the agricultural run-off has to be apportioned to changed field patterns and cultivation choices. Yes, farmers want their land to be dry - or at least not underwater - but they have come to expect to be paid for looking after the long-term interests of the environment they farm in, as opposed to short-term profit. The extreme pressure put on farms by effective cartels (supermarkets) leave very little margin and expecting farmers to make their own financial position even more precarious by making their goods less attractive to the buyers from the large chains is naive in the extreme.

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :

Could we not grow something that *likes* being underwater - rice, water buffalo ...

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:
We could work out what the maximum sea level is likely to be over the next three hundred years, and start gradually moving things out of the way, inland and higher up.
Uhm no! There are huge problems with estimating maxima. Outlying values depend hugely on the underlying distribution. Maxima are outliers by definition i.e. rare events. This is very different from when we talk of median or average, the underlying distribution can almost be ignored. When I came into my present job twenty years ago this was a research project within the Probability and Statistics department.

An interactive Graph that basically puts under water those areas lower than the level that you specify. However, this does not work for flooding. While two of the areas shown as flooded are in the news this is not completely accurate. Yorkshire seems to have got off with very little while Wales has been hit hard. This is because of the form the weather is taking. Also there almost certainly will be erosion and sediment going on so the map will be different.

So firstly the models are highly dependent on initial assumptions, secondly it looks as if there are a complex set of factors that go to create the situation.

Basically any 300 year maxima has a confidence level around it that is so huge as to make it meaningless.

Jengie

I expressed myself badly, I was meaning something like
this .

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

The climate in the UK (at the moment, at least) is not suitable for rice.

There are water-buffalo in Wales: originally imported from Asia for the Teifi marshes there are now quite a few farms with both Asian and Mediterranean buffalo. The buffalo have been such a success that Wales is now a major producer of pukka mozzarella di bufala. There are also a few herds in England.

Yes, there may be mileage in looking at water buffalo but they need some vegetation above water level.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:
The private sector will bail us out using the laws of the free market economy.

I think this is at the heart of a lot of problems with government these days (and frankly it doesn't always matter what 'wing' the government is), because it assumes that a free market economy will get everything done.

It won't, because there isn't necessarily money to be made from everything. A public sector can subsidise a useful service that isn't profitable by providing other services that are profitable. A private sector will just cut the service that isn't profitable, because that way they'll make more money overall.

Some years ago I saw a very interesting article discussing how decisions about privatising services were almost always based on ideology, not on solid observations about what would work better. Governments of all stripes should be in the business of working out whether there'll be a better result, in terms of value for money and delivery of service, from a private sector with competition between providers or from a public sector with different kinds of strengths and clout.

I think one of the biggest mistakes that so many governments make nowadays is to try and run government like a business, using business principles. It's NOT a business. That's the whole ruddy point. The motivations and drivers should be totally different.

Posted by Sober Preacher's Kid (# 12699) on :

Point of Order:

The Environment Agency's equivalent in Canada, like the US, spans many different Departments and indeed levels of government. Much of its work is done by Provincial Ministries of Natural Resources. Flood Protection is done by MNR's, mainly in Manitoba and New Brunswick, the two seriously floodprone areas in this country.

Pesticides are regulated by Health Canada and rivers and canals are handled by Transport Canada if they are commercially navigable, Parks Canada for the recreational canals and provincial MNR's for the rest.

I call bullshit on Anglican't.

Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :

He was using Guido as a a source - it's hardly surprising it's bullshit. Might as well rely on Pravda for tractor production figures.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:
The private sector will bail us out using the laws of the free market economy.
I think this is at the heart of a lot of problems with government these days (and frankly it doesn't always matter what 'wing' the government is), because it assumes that a free market economy will get everything done.

Exactly.

Essentials like water provision etc should not be subject to market forces (fear and greed).

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

It seems to lead to an ambivalence about the state amongst some people, who want a small one, that doesn't interfere in people's lives, (nanny state), until the water is bubbling up through their floor, when suddenly there is a great need for some kind of state help. I suppose deregulation is all very well, as long as things are going well, but when they go pear-shaped, you can feel awfully alone.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It seems to lead to an ambivalence about the state amongst some people, who want a small one, that doesn't interfere in people's lives, (nanny state), until the water is bubbling up through their floor, when suddenly there is a great need for some kind of state help. I suppose deregulation is all very well, as long as things are going well, but when they go pear-shaped, you can feel awfully alone.

Are those two thoughts necessarily contradictory? Libertarians sometimes speak of a 'nightwatchman state'. A nightwatchman's job, presumably, is to keep a look out for trouble and, if there is some, to do something about it.

This libertarian position is probably an extreme one, but I don't think a moderate position necessarily makes these two thoughts irreconcilable, does it?

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Essentials like water provision etc should not be subject to market forces (fear and greed).

Would you regard lavatory paper as an 'essential'?

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It seems to lead to an ambivalence about the state amongst some people, who want a small one, that doesn't interfere in people's lives, (nanny state), until the water is bubbling up through their floor, when suddenly there is a great need for some kind of state help. I suppose deregulation is all very well, as long as things are going well, but when they go pear-shaped, you can feel awfully alone.
Are those two thoughts necessarily contradictory? Libertarians sometimes speak of a 'nightwatchman state'. A nightwatchman's job, presumably, is to keep a look out for trouble and, if there is some, to do something about it.

This libertarian position is probably an extreme one, but I don't think a moderate position necessarily makes these two thoughts irreconcilable, does it?

No, I agree. I just see the right-wing as bouncing between the two positions, as deregulation sometimes brings havoc in its wake, and then deregulation is abandoned, for a while, and then picked up again, when things have calmed down. It's rather like government by crisis, which I suppose is rather exciting! But TINA, of course.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Essentials like water provision etc should not be subject to market forces (fear and greed).
Would you regard lavatory paper as an 'essential'?

Some would [Biased]

But you can't cut public service personnel and at the same time expect them to be in every flooded part of the country - something has to give. This government needs to make up its mind - as quetzalcoatl says.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

It's also about joined-up thinking, isn't it? The more I read about floods, the cause of, the more confusing it seems.

I read that the EU has been paying upland farmers to strip the hills of trees and vegetation, for some reason, which I haven't yet fathomed; on the other hand, hydrologists seem to be saying that that stops the uplands from holding water, rather like a sponge, thus increasing floods lower down.

But government in the UK tends to be for the short term - i.e. what can we do to win the next election?

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Essentials like water provision etc should not be subject to market forces (fear and greed).
Would you regard lavatory paper as an 'essential'?

Not if you have an adequate supply of Daily Mails...

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

No, no, the Daily Mail should be buried in the garden as fertilizer. It brings the rhubarb up a treat; no other newspaper is as good (rhubarb likes acid soil).

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Also good mixed with manure. There is some kind of reciprocal action, or mutual recognition going on.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

It's well known that when there's some kind of disaster or tragedy, people suddenly think it's the government's job to do so something about it, and politicians are terribly keen to be seen to 'do something'.

This is still my favourite piece from the Onion News Network

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

Interesting that when wealthy homes in middle England are flooded, money’s suddenly no object after years of "difficult decisions have to be made and extra bedrooms must be taxed".

[Roll Eyes]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yes, the TV news has taken on a whole different appearance, now they start dramatically with a famous news reader standing in water in an affluent area.

Did they do this in Somerset? Maybe they did, but my impression is that there is a sort of gasp, horror, at the idea that water is lapping at the doors of London suburbs.

But I suppose there is some sense in this also, there is a danger of a political snowball gathering, whereby people get angry, blame the government, and it could get out of control. Pickles is the man for the job! (*Sarcasm alert*).

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

Boogie

You said ...wealthy homes in middle England...: do you think the floods are only affecting owner-occupiers who've paid off their mortgage? Or perhaps think there is no social housing along the Thames Valley?

The floods are affecting everyone: the reason why its more newsworthy when it hits the Thames Valley is the sheer numbers of people involved and the knock-on effect on infrastructure for people elsewhere in the country when rail services are crippled.

[fixed code]

[ 13. February 2014, 09:09: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:

The floods are affecting everyone: the reason why its more newsworthy when it hits the Thames Valley is the sheer numbers of people involved and the knock-on effect on infrastructure for people elsewhere in the country when rail services are crippled.

And the reason why money is suddenly no object is?

Posted by pydseybare (# 16184) on :

Of course money is an object, that is a ridiculous thing to say. The costs of having protection against the current storms would have been enormous.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:

The floods are affecting everyone: the reason why its more newsworthy when it hits the Thames Valley is the sheer numbers of people involved and the knock-on effect on infrastructure for people elsewhere in the country when rail services are crippled.
And the reason why money is suddenly no object is?

Because Cameron is shitting himself, that people might get very angry, and then they might vote UKIP, or even, quelle horreur, Labour. So send for the mighty Pickles to fill the dykes! Not lesbians, I hasten to add.

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

Oh please!

Mr Cameron has announced that money will be found because it is patently obvious that the damage to be repaired will be huge.

Government making available emergency funds to homeowners forced out of their houses means that people either without insurance, or experiencing delays, can relax about paying for the (emergency) roof over their head.

The cost of Government probably paying for repairs to property where the homeowner is not insured is, in the greater scheme of things, peanuts.

As for the "where did they suddenly find the money" chorus: UK governments have always kept a reserve fund to cope with emergencies.

All those of you sniping at the PM: are you seriously suggesting things would be any different if someone else headed up the government? Ed Miliband could stop the rain, magically prevent floods, still the gales, etc, etc, etc.

Grow up. The country is experiencing unprecedented wind and rain - if you want to blame someone, try God.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Interesting that when wealthy homes in middle England are flooded, money’s suddenly no object after years of "difficult decisions have to be made and extra bedrooms must be taxed".

This did strike me as a skightly odd thing for the Prime Minister to say, particularly given the general themes of this government (even if no bedrooms have been taxed...)

There was an interesting piece by Dan Hodges in the Telegraph recently saying how at some unspecified point last weekend the floods went from being a common or garden incident (albeit a serious one) to a political crisis. Once that happened, the politicians had to spring into action.

[ 13. February 2014, 09:27: Message edited by: Anglican't ]

Posted by pydseybare (# 16184) on :

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Oh please!

Mr Cameron has announced that money will be found because it is patently obvious that the damage to be repaired will be huge.

Government making available emergency funds to homeowners forced out of their houses means that people either without insurance, or experiencing delays, can relax about paying for the (emergency) roof over their head.

Like other 'emergency' announcements Cameron has made, we should not expect this to amount to a plate of beans. Why should the state pay for people who have no insurance? Of course it won't.

quote:
The cost of Government probably paying for repairs to property where the homeowner is not insured is, in the greater scheme of things, peanuts.

And, of course, will not actually happen. Householders will have to apply to a fund of money set up with great fanfare, and it will turn out down the line that about 2 have actually received any money.

quote:
As for the "where did they suddenly find the money" chorus: UK governments have always kept a reserve fund to cope with emergencies.

I'm pretty sure they haven't got reserves to do more than clean up the mess. Otherwise they wouldn't be trying to cut the costs of running flood protection services, would they?

quote:
All those of you sniping at the PM: are you seriously suggesting things would be any different if someone else headed up the government? Ed Miliband could stop the rain, magically prevent floods, still the gales, etc, etc, etc.

Nope. But at the very least, I do not believe that Labour would have cut budgets as hard as the Tories have - because economic theories of Shock therapy are ingrained into the DNA of many Tories.

quote:
Grow up. The country is experiencing unprecedented wind and rain - if you want to blame someone, try God.

Or perhaps blame those who ignored the warnings about climate change, reduced budgets which would have reduced the effects of this storm and so on.

[ 13. February 2014, 09:33: Message edited by: pydseybare ]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Is it shock therapy? It's to do with deregulation, isn't it? This tends to produce government by crisis, since when you deregulate, you sometimes get crises arising, and then you have to leap in and put your finger in the dyke (!). Thus the small state suddenly has to become nanny state.

I certainly would not expect Mr Miliband to do any better - they are all deregulators now. I suppose we get the politicians that we deserve.

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :

pydseybare

NO ONE reduced the amount available for flood defences.

The Environment Agency was set up under a Labour administration as an umbrella organisation, taking in the old Ministry of Agriculture, National Rivers Authority, etc.

The EA is given a budget and it is the EA which decides how and where to spend the money.

No government minister, of whatever political hue, has demanded that spending on dredging, flood walls, etc, be cut. The people who run the EA have decided where to spend their money.

They have decided in some instances to spend it on removing sea walls, allowing the sea to flood inland, providing a 'soft' defence. An example of this is at Selsey in West Sussex which, with the removal of a large section of shingle bank and sea wall, is now once again really an island.

Friends down there note that the single road over the causeway needs renewing and a second route provided but the EA - wearing its conservation hat - won't give permission... so local residents expect the old Seal Island to become a reality fairly soon.

Posted by pydseybare (# 16184) on :

Sorry, I thought others would get the reference. Shock therapy is largely associated with Milton Freedman and the Chicago School of economics. Basically they believe in unfetted private markets and work towards absolutely minimal regulation.

In particular, it refers to the idea that a crisis is a good time to break down regulation and cut out red-tape.

In the view of many, the theory has never been shown to work out, but the ideas hang around for a long time because it fits in so well with Conservative/Tory dogmas.

(sorry, I can never remember which is left and which is right wing. Can't even remember which hand is which. Sue me) Shock therapy

[ 13. February 2014, 09:53: Message edited by: pydseybare ]

Posted by pydseybare (# 16184) on :

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
pydseybare

NO ONE reduced the amount available for flood defences.

I'm sorry, they absolute have. Staff have been cut and the overall budget for flood defence has been cut. The overall budget for the EA, which has a number of important regulatory functions, has been cut.

quote:
The Environment Agency was set up under a Labour administration as an umbrella organisation, taking in the old Ministry of Agriculture, National Rivers Authority, etc.

The EA is given a budget and it is the EA which decides how and where to spend the money.

Rubbish.

quote:
No government minister, of whatever political hue, has demanded that spending on dredging, flood walls, etc, be cut. The people who run the EA have decided where to spend their money.

Well that might be true, but in cutting the budgets available for infrastructure, the effect is to cut the costs of flood defences, which are a major part of the EA capital budget.

quote:
They have decided in some instances to spend it on removing sea walls, allowing the sea to flood inland, providing a 'soft' defence. An example of this is at Selsey in West Sussex which, with the removal of a large section of shingle bank and sea wall, is now once again really an island.

True but irrelevant.

quote:
Friends down there note that the single road over the causeway needs renewing and a second route provided but the EA - wearing its conservation hat - won't give permission... so local residents expect the old Seal Island to become a reality fairly soon.

The thing that is widely ignored in this debate is that the Environment Agency almost single-handedly has the flood protection expertise in England. There are no other experts - even the few academics left in universities are largely funded by the EA to do fundamental research.

If the EA cannot protect low-lying areas with the budget that they have, it is reasonable to assume that it cannot be done by anyone. If they can't do it with an increased budget, it is for sure that they can't do it with less people and less money.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

pydseybare

Thanks for that. I should have remembered that, small state, mucho privatization, deregulation, chaos.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

I saw Lord Smith say that they were constrained in terms of what they could spend by government decree - the EA, I mean. For example, they could spend £400, 000 on the Levels, and no more. Of course, I have no idea if this is true.

Posted by lowlands_boy (# 12497) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I saw Lord Smith say that they were constrained in terms of what they could spend by government decree - the EA, I mean. For example, they could spend £400, 000 on the Levels, and no more. Of course, I have no idea if this is true.

There is a rule that says that every £1 spent on flood defence must produce £8 of economic benefit. This supposedly penalises small rural communities, relative to (for example) central London. Perhaps there wasn't taken to be enough economic justification for doing anything else on the Somerset Levels.

It seems to me that such benefits would be quite hard to quantify, but I really couldn't say.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Yes, I was just replying to the idea that the EA sets its own budget, when Smith appears to contradict this, and actually said that spending on the Levels was constrained by government. Or as he put it, £400, 000 was the 'maximum amount the Treasury rules allowed us to do'. I suppose he must be right.

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Also good mixed with manure. There is some kind of reciprocal action, or mutual recognition going on.

Other newspapers need to be mixed with manure. The Daily Mail comes complete with shit in the pages

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

Its rather hard to imagine the Treasury allowing any government agency to set its own budget.

Posted by A.Pilgrim (# 15044) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lowlands_boy:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I saw Lord Smith say that they were constrained in terms of what they could spend by government decree - the EA, I mean. For example, they could spend £400, 000 on the Levels, and no more. Of course, I have no idea if this is true.
There is a rule that says that every £1 spent on flood defence must produce £8 of economic benefit. This supposedly penalises small rural communities, relative to (for example) central London. Perhaps there wasn't taken to be enough economic justification for doing anything else on the Somerset Levels.

It seems to me that such benefits would be quite hard to quantify, but I really couldn't say.

The regulation about £8 benefit per £1 spent has been quoted in the media sufficiently for me to believe it to be true. Also, that the figure of £8 was increased from £5 some while ago, and as a result a large number of proposed flood defence schemes had to be shelved because they did not meet the cost benefit requirement imposed by central government.

So whether or not the overall budget for the EA has been maintained, what they are allowed to spend it on has definitely diminished, contrary to what L'organist posted:

quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
NO ONE reduced the amount available for flood defences.
...
The EA is given a budget and it is the EA which decides how and where to spend the money.

No government minister, of whatever political hue, has demanded that spending on dredging, flood walls, etc, be cut. The people who run the EA have decided where to spend their money.
...

So we have the typical political disingenous deceit: 'We haven't cut the budget for the EA' [but we've changed the rules so they can't spend the money the way they want to].
Angus

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

Here is a good article. It is a national embarrassment that the only decent pumps in use are borrowed from Holland. We need to pour real money into upgrading all our infrastructure. With the added bonus of lots of jobs created. The money can come from projects which are pure waste - trident, banker's bonuses, huge unnecessary profits for utilities etc etc. the list is endless.

From the article - "On Newsnight the other evening, confronted by an audience of flood victims, Philip Hammond, the cabinet's God of Defence, reiterated what many in his party have suddenly started to say. Individuals have some responsibility for protecting themselves against floods. Local councils have some responsibility for protecting their boroughs against floods. But infrastructural protection against floods is a huge job, a national job, a job that the state has to oversee. There is no private-sector solution here, not even in the spacious realm of neoliberal fantasy."

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
The money can come from projects which are pure waste - trident, banker's bonuses, huge unnecessary profits for utilities etc etc. the list is endless.

Putting aside the question whether these things really are 'pure waste', some of the money in this list isn't even the government's to spend.

[code]

[ 15. February 2014, 11:21: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

Posted by deano (# 12063) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
The money can come from projects which are pure waste - trident, banker's bonuses, huge unnecessary profits for utilities etc etc. the list is endless.
Putting aside the question whether these things really are 'pure waste', some of the money in this list isn't even the government's to spend.

[code]

To a great many lefties though, all money is for the government to spend, as though being "a government" somehow makes them know better. Silly but there you go.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by deano:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
The money can come from projects which are pure waste - trident, banker's bonuses, huge unnecessary profits for utilities etc etc. the list is endless.
Putting aside the question whether these things really are 'pure waste', some of the money in this list isn't even the government's to spend.

[code]
To a great many lefties though, all money is for the government to spend, as though being "a government" somehow makes them know better. Silly but there you go.

Bollocks. Many lefties, and not a few elsewhere, want higher government spending as an alternative to Osborne's ideological attachment to Friedmanomics, but precious few anywhere want to leave you with nothing more than pocket money.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

With Osborne you are getting higher government spending year on year.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
With Osborne you are getting higher government spending year on year.

And the budget deficit is increasing too, AFAICT. That increased spending isn't funded by tax receipts, it's the consequence of the continued recession. Can't Osborne achieve anything?

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
With Osborne you are getting higher government spending year on year.
And the budget deficit is increasing too, AFAICT. That increased spending isn't funded by tax receipts, it's the consequence of the continued recession. Can't Osborne achieve anything?

The deficit is falling, though debt is rising. If nothing else, he's doing better than Balls would.

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
With Osborne you are getting higher government spending year on year.
And the budget deficit is increasing too, AFAICT. That increased spending isn't funded by tax receipts, it's the consequence of the continued recession. Can't Osborne achieve anything?
The deficit is falling, though debt is rising. If nothing else, he's doing better than Balls would.

Of course, you have absolutely no means of knowing that.

Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
The deficit is falling, though debt is rising. If nothing else, he's doing better than Balls would.

There's a reasonable case to be made - except amongst those who confuse household and government spending - that the deficit is falling for entirely the wrong reasons.

Cutting back on maintaining infrastructure - for example - makes very little sense. You have to spend on it eventually, the costs balloon over time, and in the meantime you leave yourself open to outlying events.

Posted by Uriel (# 2248) on :

I have no comment to offer on right wing governments, but on governments too focussed on London and the South East. It took 6 weeks of Somerset (my County) being under water before a minister turned up to see what all the fuss was about. But once the Thames flooded part of the Home Counties, within 24 hours the Prime Minister is running round like a headless chicken promising that money will be no object to sort it all out.

Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :

It's the numbers - 40 houses in the Levels, around 1000 houses in the Thames Valley, 25 times the scale of damage. Plus the transport network being taken out for huge swathes of the country.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
The deficit is falling, though debt is rising. If nothing else, he's doing better than Balls would.
Of course, you have absolutely no means of knowing that.

The same could be said for quite a lot of comments made on this site.

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

Tu quoque, I believe is the phrase

Posted by alienfromzog (# 5327) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
With Osborne you are getting higher government spending year on year.
And the budget deficit is increasing too, AFAICT. That increased spending isn't funded by tax receipts, it's the consequence of the continued recession. Can't Osborne achieve anything?
The deficit is falling, though debt is rising. If nothing else, he's doing better than Balls would.

An expert's critique of Mr Osborne

If you look at the predictions made in 2010/11 about the effects of Osborne's economic policies by Mr Osborne himself and by Mr Balls, one of them has been consistently wrong, one has been significantly vindicated. Care to guess which is which?

AFZ

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

I think, at best, both have been wrong.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

That's an interesting argument, though, which has several planks:

1. You can't cut your way out of a depression, since the cuts depress the economy.

2. Economies eventually tend to grow again, but it's false logic to claim that it's your policies which did it.

However, one has to issue a warning here - politics has never been about logic, so point 2 is pretty much irrelevant. Of course, politicians are going to claim post hoc ergo propter hoc*, and they'd be damn fools if they didn't.

Of course, if something bad happened, you can always blame the previous government, which is a kind of delayed post hoc.

*a fallacy of the structure, 'if A occurs after B, then it is caused by B'.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
That's an interesting argument, though, which has several planks:

1. You can't cut your way out of a depression, since the cuts depress the economy.

2. Economies eventually tend to grow again, but it's false logic to claim that it's your policies which did it.

However, one has to issue a warning here - politics has never been about logic, so point 2 is pretty much irrelevant. Of course, politicians are going to claim post hoc ergo propter hoc*, and they'd be damn fools if they didn't.

Of course, if something bad happened, you can always blame the previous government, which is a kind of delayed post hoc.

*a fallacy of the structure, 'if A occurs after B, then it is caused by B'.

Politics isn't really been about economics either. It's mostly about getting elected and once elected, getting re-elected.

Or, as I read years ago "Good economics is bad politics, bad economics is good politics, bad politics is good economics and good politics is bad economics".

And the idea that the national economy is like a household is less sound than comparing the electricity in a Duracell battery to that in HT cables.

UBB.classic^TM 6.5.0